Chapter 18 June 406 AD Paulsland Capital-Meeting of Stockholders

            Due to the changes in the Paulson Industries focus, where their factories stopped building a whole host of goods and started building steam weapons, alongside the need to rebuild a lot of factories that were damaged during the war with Rome, the insecurity as they continue fighting a Kush with steam weapons, among a whole host of other changes in the last year, a call was made for all major stockholders to come for a meeting. In fact, due to the abundant changes in Paulsland, several of the seventy families were calling for stockholder meetings as they readjusted their priorities.

            Due to Paulsland laws on income tax and limiting an individual’s corporate ownership to just ten percent of a company, the people coming to the stockholders' meeting were individuals who owned pieces of various factories that were built by someone in the Paulson family. That meant that although the Paulson Family Industries were controlled by the Paulson family, it also meant that, in theory, it wasn’t controlled by one person. In practice, Malkia was in charge. Malkia was the head of the Paulson family, the same way someone was the head of one of the seventy families across Paulsland; she controlled enough of the factories and distribution system that she could strangle the business of any family member who tried to buck her authority.

            One of the reasons why the steam engine was opposed by the seventy families was because the heads of the seventy families clearly knew how to control the current industrial base of Paulsland, and they were very fearful that if a new technology arose, they would lose their power base. Their power base consisted of the reality that each factory only built one part of the greater whole. For instance, one factory made thread, the next weaved it into cloth, the next factory turned the cloth into clothes, sails, or some other finished good. The thing was that every factory was somewhat limited due to the water wheel design. This meant that if one of the factories tried to buck the system, the heads of the various families could bankrupt them by either not sending them goods to finish or not buying their unfinished goods. Furthermore if that particular factory was somehow able to survive by selling directly to customers, the family head would also sell directly to their customers at a price below what it cost to make the goods, until the factory that wasn’t being obedient went bankrupt. There were very few exceptions to this rule; unfortunately for the seventy families, Jinka’s matchstick factory was one, as his was the only matchstick factory, and his factory didn’t need any other factory to make or distribute his goods. Normally, they would rush to build their own matchstick factories to strangle his, but with all the destruction during the war, and the need to build the new weapons, a matchstick factory was not a priority, especially since Jinka was already building other factories beyond the matchstick one.

            Despite that one blot, this system was very good at finding people who were able to keep this system alive. Anyone with the luck to be born into one of the seventy families, and the ability to coordinate between the various factories, was able to get bonuses, buy stock, and accumulate stock in enough factories that after a couple of decades, they were either the head of the family, or obviously the next head. It wasn’t even hard for individuals with talent to find stock to buy across the seventy families, as stock was often given as wedding gifts or passed on to children when someone died. Those without talent or ambition sold it to those with talent and ambition. Each family had thousands of individuals, and the corporate system meant that only the best in the family became the head, and that head had a lot of incentives to make sure the game did not change.

            As for the other stockholders, the King was technically a full ten percent stockholder in every Paulson family corporation, as every King was a member of the Paulson family. Technically at this time Jinka was in control of the King’s share of the company, but he wasn’t around and his proxies kept dying in terrible accidents, and as long as the two Halls of Representatives were controlled by the seventy families the detectives would keep ruling Jinka’s proxies deaths as accidents, no matter how many times they were poisoned, bludgeoned, and stabbed in the back.

              One area that made the Paulsland corporations very popular to work at was that each corporation, whether it was a factory, logistics, or something else, gave workers a percentage of stock as long as they worked there, and each worker got a bonus based on the dividend paid out in stock. As such, each corporation sent worker representation. This was overall seen as a very good thing, as someone like Malkia couldn’t possibly know how each factory, ship, or specialized corporation was run, and as such, the worker representatives could give insight nobody else had. It was well known that corporations that did not listen to their workers often went bankrupt soon after.

            If one didn’t know how interconnected and incestuous the seventy families were, they would be surprised to find representatives from all seventy families at the Paulson family industries stockholders meeting. Nearly a third of the people at the meeting were from the other families, as the families liked to invest in each other’s stocks. In fact, stock was often given as marriage gifts, bringing the families closer together… at least those with skill and ambition.

            Nearly ten thousand people showed up to the stockholders' meeting. Over the three-day time period, the stockholders met in relatively small rooms to deal with the business for the various small corporations that made up Paulson Family Industries, but in the evening, they met in a large auditorium to discuss the industries as a whole. The reason for this was because some of the products they sold, like the steam rifles, required over fifty factories, each legally listed as a different corporation, to supply all the parts for one rifle and the pressure vessel to power it.

            At the end of the first day, Malkia stood before the stockholders and said, “I would like to say that this year was the most profitable in decades, and it looks like it will be the most profitable in the history of Paulson Family Industries.” The stockholders gladly clapped and cheered. They were getting dividends from the stock, so more profit only helped them. With income tax being viciously enforced, they were very certain they would know exactly how much profit was being made and how much would end up in their pockets.

            Malkia continued, “Just today, a convoy from Saka arrived and offered us one hundred pounds of bronze per steam rifle and pressure vessel, and three tons of bronze for every cannon and pressure vessel we make.” The crowd paused for a moment in awe, then once again loudly clapped and cheered. That meant that each rifle was worth about five pounds of gold, and each cannon was worth about three hundred pounds of gold. Nobody wanted to give up that much gold, so they generally traded in iron, tin, copper, brass, and bronze, with bronze being the most valuable.

            Someone yelled out, “Wait until Satavahana or Chutus gets here with their convoys! We are going to drain those countries dry of every coin they have.” More cheering erupted.

            Malkia nodded and waited for everyone to calm down before saying, “That’s very true. That said, we cannot charge Paulsland cities so much, but let's just say we are still making a very nice profit protecting our own nation.

            Malkia continued talking about the steam weapons trade for nearly an hour, and went into technical details on the process, covered bottlenecks, plans to fix the bottlenecks, and plans to make logistics more efficient. Far from being bored, the stockholders held on to her every word, and many gave solutions to problems she brought up. The reality was that the better the companies did, the more money they made, so they gladly worked together to come up with a solution.

            Once they were finished discussing steam weapons, she said, “Several months ago, we sent an expedition to find the Merchant Guild, and they found something else entirely. They found a group of very violent people called the Cubans, and we have learned a lot from them, and our corporation is in an interesting position to exploit this information.

            “We have learned that the Cubans have a generational blockade of over half a dozen nations, including the Merchant Guild. Many of you are aware that our navigators could not make heads or tails of the Merchant Guilds navigation books that they left us, and it may simply be because they had to go a very long way around the Cubans. Assuming we can break the Cuban blockade, we will have a monopoly on sea trade for the area.

            “What I propose is twofold. First of all, we send a fully armed expedition, with our new steam weapons, and force the Cubans to let us trade with everyone in their area of influence. Second, we should start a colony on the gigantic river our expedition found south of the Cubans. In order to facilitate this new venture, I suggest we start a new company called the Western Trading Company.”

            With that, thousands of the most wealthy and influential people in Paulsland began working out the details of a new corporation. One that would have the creation of a new armed merchant fleet, a well-defended colony, and most importantly, the creation of a treaty between Cuba and the Western Trading Company, where their ships could have free passage, but Cuba could continue to treat everyone else like they always had.

            Malkia didn’t have time nor inclination to talk or share the other information they received from the Cubans, such as their language, that they were fighting a war with Rome and were currently punishing the Merchant Guild with raids on their shores, or a new weapon called a fast-fire bow. As for the fast-fire bows that were found with the Cubans, the Paulson Family Industries still needed time to test them to see if they would be profitable, and if so, Malkia would create a completely new corporation, or several, for their construction and distribution, but that would be for another day.

Authors note- Next week I plan on finally introducing the locomotive, although I may have to go back and add a few chapters if I rushed to that part of the story to quickly